A quartet of Maryland-restricted stakes at Laurel Park on Saturday has brought out four of the most accomplished, and popular, local horses of the past two years.
The $75,000 Howard and Sondra Bender Memorial will mark a return to competition for both Still Having Fun, winner of the Grade 2 Woody Stephens Stakes in 2018, and the 3-year-old Alwaysmining, who reeled off six consecutive victories between fall 2018 and this April, topped by the Federico Tesio.
ETOBICOKE, Ontario – When his racing days are over, the incomparable Pink Lloyd will probably take up residence at LongRun Thoroughbred Retirement Society’s Ontario farm, according to trainer Robert Tiller, who said the 7-year-old gelding is slated for one more campaign after winning his season finale in the Grade 2 Kennedy Road Stakes.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – The prospective starting lineup for Saturday’s $200,000 Claiming Crown Jewel grew by two shortly before entry time Wednesday with both Third Day and Noble Thought supplemented to the race at a cost of $5,000 apiece.
Anothertwistafate, the winner of the El Camino Real Derby at Golden Gate Fields last February and later 10th in the Preakness Stakes, resumed training in November.
“He’s been jogging and we’re taking things slow,” trainer Blaine Wright said. “We don’t have a breeze targeted yet. He needs to get his muscle tone back.”
Owned by Peter Redekop, Anothertwistafate has won 3 of 7 starts and earned $303,500. Last spring, Anothertwistafate was second in two Grade 3 races – the Sunland Park Derby in New Mexico and the Lexington Stakes at Keeneland.
Anna Meah, who began training in late 2018, is planning to relocate the majority of her stable to Kentucky in early 2020.
Meah said on Wednesday that she will send most of her 20-horse stable to Kentucky “at the end of February or beginning of March.” A few statebreds will remain in California.
She said the decision was based on the wishes of several of her clients, the attractive purses in Kentucky, and the uncertainty surrounding California racing, which has seen a decline in racing dates in the last nine months.
The chaos that dominated the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile at Santa Anita on Nov. 1 affected third-place finisher Wrecking Crew as much as it did odds-on favorite Dennis’ Moment, who stumbled badly at the start.
Wrecking Crew was fourth on the backstretch, but lost momentum when racing in traffic on the final turn. The ridgling eventually finished third by 3 1/4 lengths behind the upset winner Storm the Court at 45-1. Trainer Peter Miller thought Wrecking Crew should have been the upset winner at 39-1.
OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Gary West doesn’t remember the last time he was at Aqueduct, though he knows it was before the casino adjacent to the track opened in the fall of 2011.
When told that the casino is always hopping, West said, “I hope the racetrack is hopping as much as the casino.”
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – There are no graded stakes races on the schedule this weekend at Gulfstream Park, but there will be action aplenty nonetheless, with the Claiming Crown back for an eighth straight season Saturday followed by the third local renewal of the Clasico Internacional del Caribe, featuring the best horses from Latin America and the Caribbean on Sunday.
